The ability to control the motion of colloidal objects and other matter dispersed inside fluids has a wide range of applications in sensing, biomaterial synthesis, microfluidics, lab-on-a-chip, photonics, electronics assembly, genome analysis, and assembling cellular systems. One of the main limitations in biosensor applications, for example, is the inherent difficulty in efficiently bringing target molecules into proximal contact with the sensor regions on the surface. Current mixing techniques are effective in moving fluids in the bulk but much less effective in moving fluids near surface interfaces. The relative slow motion of fluids near surfaces contributes to the inability for molecules, colloidal objects, and cells to easily diffuse towards surfaces. This effect substantially decreases the probability for these objects to interact with surfaces. In the case of biosensors, this problem reduces the sensitivity of the biosensor since the time required for target molecules to reach a sensor region is greatly increased. In the case of surface conjugation and material synthesis, the ineffective diffusion of molecules towards surface interfaces greatly increases the time for chemical reactions to take place on surfaces.
The ability to move fluid near surfaces has additional applications, such as in stretching and perturbing objects attached to surfaces and arranging colloidal objects into precise geometric patterns on a substrate surface.
Surfaces containing an array of colloidal objects have been fabricated in the past for applications in photonic crystals, and magnetic and electric sensors. Self-assembly techniques for arranging colloidal patterns by hydrodynamic currents and by surface tension forces have been successful for arranging identical components on surfaces (Ozin et al. Adv. Func. Mater. 2001 11:95, Xia et al. Adv. Func. Mater. 2003 13:907). Most traditional self-assembly techniques, however, fall short when it comes to assembling multi-component ordered patterns. Manipulating fluids and building multi-component surfaces on micrometer and nanometer length scales remains a major challenge.
While significant time and resources have been invested in the area of mixing, pumping, and creating multi-component surfaces, no single technique has been developed to date that can efficiently program the movement of fluids near surfaces simultaneously over large areas on a microscopic scale.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,415,821 and 6,408,884, disclose a method for moving bulk fluid through channels using slugs of ferrofluid that are designed to be immiscible with the fluid of interest (Greivell, et al., 1997, IEEE Trans. Biomed. Eng. 44:129).
U.S. Pat. No. 4,808,079 discloses a pump for ferrofluid, again designed to produce bulk fluid motion.
In addition, micron-sized magnetic particles that are physically attached to various molecules, such as proteins, DNA fragments or fluorescent labels, have been arranged into programmable geometric patterns using magnetic forces and magnetically encoded surfaces (Yellen et al. J. Appl. Phys. 2003 93:7331; Yellen et al. Langmuir 2004 20:2553; Yellen et al. Adv. Mat. 2004 16:111). Previous work has shown that the number of particles deposited (or not deposited) at each array lattice site can be reliably controlled through a combination of magnetic and morphological template features. Regular heterogeneous colloidal patterns were assembled by this technique using only physical forces (i.e. magnetic, macroscopic hydrodynamic and surface forces). The theoretical process of particle assembly onto magnetic surfaces has also been analyzed previously in order to guide experimental investigations (Yellen et al. 2002 J. Appl. Phys. 912:855; Yellen et al. J. Appl. Phys. 2003 93:8447; Plaks et al. IEEE Trans. Mag. 2003 39:1436; and Hovorka et al. IEEE Trans Mag. 2003 39:2549).
In the present invention devices are provided for mixing and manipulating non-magnetic particles, not by attachment to a magnetic particle, but rather by suspension in a fluid containing magnetic particles. Control of the motions of non-magnetic particles in the devices of the present invention is accomplished using an effective diamagnetic force that can be applied on non-magnetic particles in a fluid also containing magnetic particles. The substantial magnetization acquired by a fluid comprising a large volume fraction of magnetic particles transmits this force to any non-magnetic or low magnetically susceptible particles suspended in the same fluid. Magnetization on the fluid is controlled on a micron scale with at least two magnetic field sources positioned in close proximity to, or inside of the chamber holding the fluid. These magnetic field sources allow for non-magnetic particles suspended in the fluid to be locally manipulated near surfaces in which the fluid is in contact with in a highly controllable fashion.
Using these devices, magnetic particles can be circulated around selected substrate sites in order to manipulate the surrounding fluid and non-magnetic particles including, but not limited to, molecules, proteins, colloidal objects and cells, contained within the fluid. These devices are useful in increasing the sensitivity of biosensors, in decreasing reaction times at surface interfaces by more efficiently bringing chemical reagents to surface interfaces, in perturbing, stretching and dislodging molecules and objects attached to surfaces, and in providing a method for sorting or arranging one or more different types of components into pre-programmed arrangements.